


skin lessons

by sibley (ferns)



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Coping, F/M, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Trans Characters, Triggers, its only explicit with cisco though, semi unresolved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-27
Updated: 2018-01-27
Packaged: 2019-03-09 23:21:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13491960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ferns/pseuds/sibley
Summary: Cynthia’s fingers brush over his heart.It could have been worse.Cisco covers her mouth.It could have been worse.





	skin lessons

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings for talk of what happened to Cisco on the Flash (i.e. murder) and referenced (canonical) rape. These events are not described in detail but this is a fic about dealing with PTSD, so they are referenced and talked about even if it's not graphic. If those things are particularly triggering for you, I recommend skipping this one. (All talk of rape takes place after the first/only line break, so if you want to you can read only the first half.)

It starts out well. Cynthia was waiting for Cisco when he got home, loudly rooting around in his kitchen for food when he opened the door. Since she was a fairly normal intruder, he didn’t really care unless she was going to steal from his candy stash, which was well hidden as a leftover habit from sharing a room with Dante as a kid but incredibly easy for Cynthia to find. It’s a game now. To see how well he can hide it.

“Hey,” she calls, pulling back out of one of his cabinets. “I found it again.” She holds up the plastic bag. “You’re getting sloppy, Ramon.”

Cisco groans and sits down on the couch, rubbing a hand down his face. “I was in a hurry when I left this morning, okay? Sorry it doesn’t live up to your hiding standards.”

Cynthia shoves some chocolate into her mouth and smiles around it. She sits down in his lap, one leg on either side, and leans back so he can’t reach past her for the candy bag. “Well, since I found it, it’s mine now.” She kisses his nose and he wipes the chocolate from her lips that gets left behind away. “You can have some if you’re good.”

“If I’m _good,_ huh?” Cisco raises his eyebrows. Cynthia has the ability to lift just one. He doesn’t. It’s a source of bitterness. She grins at him and unbuttons the top button on his shirt and now he _seriously_ regrets wearing it since this is going to take forever if she’s planning on undoing every single one.

“Mmhmm.” Cynthia gets stuck for a second on a particularly stubborn button. She’s not always good with fine motor control. Cisco hasn’t asked why yet. The little scars going down her fingers tell him enough as it is. “If you’re good.”

Cisco grins. This is nice. Knowing their track record, they’re probably going to be interrupted in two seconds by some inconvenient world-ending disaster, but for now he can enjoy this and pray that it lasts.

And then Cynthia’s fingers brush over his heart.

It’s an accident-she’s moving his shirt back after finally getting all the buttons undone, being mindful of his mastectomy scars, and her knuckles press against his skin. Cisco’s whole body flinches back and his fingers tighten on the edge of the couch. There’s no vibe this time, and he’s not sure if he says anything, but it’s enough that Cynthia stands up and sits on his coffee table instead.

_(In many ways, you have shown me what it is like to have a son.)_

Cisco grips her hands so hard it almost hurts, trying to breathe through the strangled feeling in his throat and the hot sickly tightness in his chest. Everything sounds far away and distorted and he closes his eyes, trying to take deep breaths in through his nose and out through his mouth. Cynthia doesn’t say anything, just rubs her thumbs over the back of his hands and silently holds out the bag of assorted candy when he opens his eyes.

Hands shaking, he takes it, blindly reaching inside and pulling out a piece of red licorice from an already open package. It’s an automatic motion, robotic and stiff. “I’m sorry.”

“You shouldn’t be,” Cynthia says softly. She hasn’t taken her eyes off him. “What did I do?” When he hesitates, she adds, “You don’t have to tell me _why_ you reacted, although I’d like to know so that I can find the person who did it and make them _pay._ But you don’t have to tell me why. Just what I did to hurt you. So that I never do it again.”

Both of Cisco’s hands clasp at his heart and he swallows thickly. “Right there,” he chokes out, before clearing his throat and trying again. It comes out stronger this time. “Right there. It’s-I-I don’t like talking about it.”

“You don’t have to.” Cynthia promises as she holds out the bag again, shaking it a little to draw Cisco’s attention to it. “But are they dead? Whoever hurt you… Can they do it again?”

_(Forgive me, but to me, you’ve been dead for centuries.)_

“I don’t know,” Cisco admits. At Cynthia’s murderous look, he holds up one hand, keeping the other one pressed firmly against his chest. It shields his heart _and_ it reminds him that it’s still beating inside him. Still alive, still alive, still alive. “It’s complicated. There’s time travel involved. The Wells who did it-no, no, not Harry, don’t look at me like that, I hate him but he’s not… Okay, yeah, he’s the worst, but he’s never murdered me, so…”

He takes a few more deep breaths while Cynthia thinks that over, mind repeating _murder murder murder_ over and over and over again. “Do you want me to hurt Wells for you?” She asks. “Not kill him. Maybe kill him, if that’s what you want.” Killing and hurting people is messy. She doesn’t, contrary to what a lot of people seem to think, actually enjoy killing people. Hurting is another story, but most of the time she dislikes it just as much. There’s a difference between _liking_ something and being good at it. But for Cisco… “Maybe.”

“No, no, it’s okay.” He sighs. “Okay, it’s not okay. He doesn’t like me and I don’t like him and he triggers the flashbacks on purpose by jabbing his hands around my heart and-and I don’t like him. But I don’t want you to hurt the guy. For his daughter’s sake. You’ve met Jesse, right? She’s pretty nice.”

Cynthia clenches her fists. “He does _what?”_

“It’s not a big thing,” Cisco promises fast without even thinking about it. He bites at his lower lip and at the inside of his cheek. “...It’s a big thing,” he admits with a sigh. “But I don’t want you to kill him. Okay? And he hasn’t given me flashbacks in awhile, just gotten up in my face and yelled at me and it was scary, yeah, but nothing I can’t handle and haven’t taken, y’know? It’s not worth killing someone over.”

“To you.” Cynthia’s eyes flicker red and Cisco just _barely_ manages not to flinch away. Breathe, breathe, breathe, it’s not Thawne, it’s _Cindy_ for fuck’s sake she’s not going to do anything to hurt him. She calms herself when she sees his reaction and her eyes stop flashing. “I don’t like the idea of you getting hurt. Ever. You’re-you’re off limits to people. They hurt you, that means they deal with me.”

“I know.” Cisco swallows. He really does know that, and he does take some comfort in it, but it’s not much. He stays silent while he watches Cynthia consider driving a knife into Harry’s skull. Honestly, he’s not quite sure if he would stop her. For Jesse’s sake, maybe he would.

He doesn’t even realize how long he’s been quiet for until Cynthia nudges him with her knee oh so slightly and gently. “Is this okay? Do you want me to move?”

Cisco considers not answering, but… What was it his therapist said about trigger-related anxiety? Not to let communication shut down? And to not retreat into his own head? It had been something like that, right? “Do you think you could-um-come over and sit next to me? Don’t-don’t touch my chest, or anything, but you can keep holding my hands. It’s-touch is good, for me. It… Helps, most of the time.”

 _(Do you know how hard it has been to keep all of this from you?_ Especially _from you?)_

Silently relieved that there’s something she can do to help him feel better, Cynthia moves to sit next to him, squeezing his hand tightly and setting the bag of candy down in his lap. “I’m sorry,” she says softly and earnestly. “It’ll never happen again.”

Cisco’s not really sure if she’s talking about all the stuff with Wells or touching his heart and decides it’s probably both. He swallows and tries to lighten the mood a little bit, attempting to shove all thoughts of red-eyed demons clawing at his chest out of his mind. “I thought I wasn’t going to get the candy bag back.”

“You earned it,” Cynthia answers simply. “Wanna watch a movie or something?” She elbows him very lightly in the ribs, watching carefully to see if he flinches. He doesn’t. “I still haven’t seen your whale space movie. You know the one. It has the guy you had a kiddie crush on. Space Walk, or whatever.”

“You _know_ it’s Star Trek,” Cisco groans, secretly grateful for this old conversation to take his mind off things. Cynthia grins into his shoulder. Mission successful. “Every time you say ‘Space Walk’ it’s like you’re stabbing me in the gut, you know that? You know damn well that it’s called Star Trek.”

“Yeah, fine, I know it’s called Star Walk.” Cynthia jerks away when Cisco throws a little piece of candy at her, laughing. Thank god, he’s feeling better, but she still feels guilty, even though she’s sure it could’ve been a hundred times worse if she somehow hadn’t _noticed_ the flinch and had kept going.

She reminds herself to pay Wells a visit the next time she sees him at STAR Labs. _Nobody_ is allowed to hurt Cisco and get away with it. _Nobody._

It could have been worse.

* * *

“Are you sure we should be in here?” Cynthia stands up on her toes and pokes at an IV bag after looking around Caitlin’s little closet-storeroom. “We might break something.”

Cisco frowns and looks at her out of the corner of his eye. “Why do you care? That’s… Uncharacteristic of you.”

“If there’s one place that should remain uncompromised, it’s your infirmary,” Cynthia informs him. She keeps poking around anyway. “If this was any other room, I wouldn’t really care. But you never know when you’re going to need yourself patched up. Which is also why it’s best not to piss off doctors.”

“I guess that’s fair.” Cisco shrugs. “But it’s not like there’s a lot of breakable stuff in here anyway.”

On cue, he turns around to face Cynthia and knocks a thankfully empty glass beaker that Cisco’s pretty sure originally belonged to Hartley onto the floor, where it shatters into twenty pieces.

Cynthia and Cisco look at each other and unanimously decide to bolt before Caitlin can get back, sprinting out of the room and down the hall. Cynthia’s a lot faster than he is, so she slows down so he’ll be able to keep up, gripping Cisco’s hand and pulling him into a side room where they press against the wall.

For a moment they stay silent. Cisco giggles a little, and Cynthia pushes one finger up to his lips and shakes her head a tiny bit.

“Shh,” she hisses, eyes darting around like Caitlin is going to come out of nowhere and stab both of them with one of her scalpels.

Cisco responds by giggling louder, making her shush him louder, which leads to him clamping his hand tightly over her mouth.

The next thing he sees is the ceiling as his back slams hard against the floor. He gasps in pain, winded, and tries to sit up, blinking away dizziness. “...Cindy?”

She backs away from him further into the room until she hits the back wall, hugging herself tightly. Cisco scrambles to his feet, wincing and trying to catch his breath as he massages at his ribs. She looks at him, breathing heavily, and forces her hands down to her sides as her fingers twitch.

_(The car-I cut myself-)_

Cisco reaches out. “Cindy? Are you okay?” Something’s wrong. “It’s alright. You’re safe. You know me, right?...Cindy?”

_(Nakia… Nakia… It’s alright, Nakia. You’re safe.)_

Cynthia swallows down the tide of bad memories and steadies herself on the wall. “I’m-I’m okay. Cisco. Cisco. I’m okay. I’m okay.”

“Yeah, I don’t really believe you. Do you wanna sit down?” He sits as an example, and she follows suit, sliding down the wall with her knees coming up to her chest. Cisco bites his lip. “What was that?”

“I tried to run away when I was fourteen,” Cynthia tells him. It sounds far away and thin to her own ears, and her voice is barely above a whisper. Cisco strains to hear it. He waits expectantly for her to say something else, but she doesn’t. Just stares past him at the doorway while she rubs the side of her knee with her thumb.

“Okay,” Cisco says before the silence in the little side room can stretch out too long. “Was it me touching your mouth?” She nods silently and he frowns a tiny bit. “But I’ve kissed you before, and-”

“But not like you just did.” Cynthia still doesn’t look at him. “Kissing and just touching my mouth is okay. That’s fine. It didn’t used to be fine, but it’s better now. But this time you covered my mouth, and my vision just-went white.” Now she _does_ look at him, and Cisco’s horrified to see that she’s crying a little bit. “I’m so, _so_ sorry. Are you okay?” 

“I don’t think it’ll bruise, I don’t bruise easily. And-hey. _I’m_ sorry, alright? I didn’t mean to scare you.” Cisco half wants to crawl over and wipe at her tears and half wants to run in the other direction from an unfamiliar situation involving his girlfriend crying because of something that _he_ did.

“I wasn’t scared,” she lies, looking away again. Eye contact is hard. “I was just… A little startled. That’s-that’s all. Not scared.”

“Alright.” Cisco doesn’t push it. Cynthia didn’t push when he told her all he wanted to tell her about what happened with Wells-what happened with Thawne, so he’s not going to push now. Even if he wants to. But he does have a question. “You know how you asked me if the person who hurt me was dead? Well, is-whoever hurt you dead too?”

Cisco generally considers himself fairly nonviolent. He’ll fight back in self defense and he knows how to fight at least a _little_ bit, but even though he’s got a petty streak a mile wide and is extremely good at holding grudges, his methods of revenge usually don’t take the form of actual physical violence. Right now, though, he wants to track down whoever made Cynthia feel like this and kill them. It’s a little surprising

“I killed him,” Cynthia says simply. Her voice is flat and hard and unreadable, like she’s describing one of her missions. “A few years ago. He came after me again. And I killed him.”

_(Nakia, you don’t understand. I love you. I was created for you.)_

Cisco nods, eyes hard, as one of his hands clenches tightly into a fist. He forces it to relax before Cynthia can see it. He knows she wouldn’t hurt him on purpose, but she’s already tosses him onto the ground once today because he startled her, and he’d rather not make it two when she’s already high strung like this. “Good. I’m glad he’s dead.”

“More than dead,” Cynthia mutters. Her eyes gleam a little, the familiar red that sets Cisco’s teeth on edge returning. It vanishes and he forces the tension out of his shoulders. He needs to work on that. On telling the difference between Thawne’s malicious glowing and Cynthia’s emotion-driven flickers. It’s hard. “When my dad-the body-”

She almost starts laughing and stops herself just in time. Cisco doesn’t say anything. She’ll tell him more when _she_ wants to, not a moment sooner. Cynthia’s like a cat. Her terms are her terms and most of the time she’s just content to _exist_ with you, and while she’s fiercely protective (especially of Cisco) she isn’t very trusting. Not that Cisco expects anyone to be trusting when it comes to trauma. He can hardly even talk about it with his therapist.

“I’m glad,” he repeats. “Should I come over there? I-you know I like being touched when I’m trying to calm down, do you-”

“No,” Cynthia says fast before he can even finish. She hugs herself tightly. “I don’t. I can’t. I’m sorry.”

Cisco shrugs a little. Yes, he’s a little disappointed and upset that there’s nothing he can really do, but it’s not about him. “There’s nothing to apologize for.”

“...I don’t know if I’ll be able to tell you about any of it,” Cynthia sighs softly. She studies the wall behind Cisco and counts the number of chips in the paint she can see. “I haven’t even told my _dad_ about all of it, and I tell him pretty much everything.”

“That’s alright,” Cisco promises. “It’s hard for me to talk about when I-when Wells-” He swallows past the lump in his throat. “Yeah. Just-I get it. Alright? And if you ever _do_ want to talk about it, I’m here.”

The two of them sit together in silence, not touching each other, while Cynthia counts paint cracks and relearns how to breathe.

Cisco thinks about a monster shrouded in red lightning reaching for his beating heart and his breath hitches. Cynthia thinks about a monster wearing the face of a man who makes her head go fuzzy and holds her wrists down and her heart skips a few beats.

“I was fourteen,” she whispers, burying her face in her knees. Her hands shake. “Fuck, Cisco. I was fourteen.”

He scoots closer and doesn’t say anything, just sitting closeby. She said she didn’t want him to touch her, so he won’t despite the instincts screaming in his chest and telling him to pull her into a tight hug and never let her go. “I know. It’s okay. I know.”

Cisco’s back slowly stops hurting. He’s so glad the person who hurt Cynthia like this is gone. He can’t imagine how much worse this could have gone if she hadn’t flipped him like that and had just shut down.

It could have been worse.


End file.
